


everything i ask for (and just a little bit more)

by freshstartfever



Category: One Direction (Band), Radio 1 RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Office, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-06
Updated: 2014-09-06
Packaged: 2018-02-16 08:01:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2262045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/freshstartfever/pseuds/freshstartfever
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“Two months ago, I was going into the one of the most important meetings of my career. I had to create a huge PowerPoint and present it to my bosses and everything. When I logged onto my account to pull up the presentation, all that was saved there was a video that Louis took in Photobooth, looking bored while that rollercoaster backdrop was playing.”</i>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>an AU in which Nick is a fashion editor and Louis is his assistant. it goes about as well as it sounds.</p>
            </blockquote>





	everything i ask for (and just a little bit more)

**Author's Note:**

> this has been a work in progress for quite some time. none of this would have been possible without kelly, lina, and jamie. thank you. title is from the maine's song "everything i ask for". this is my first fic on here, but hopefully not my last...i don't own any of these people, the only thing that's mine are the words written. this is a complete work of fiction. enjoy!

Nick absolutely fucking hates Mondays.  

"Good morning, Mr. Grimshaw," is the first thing Nick hears when he walks into the office. It sounds like a small, innocent voice, and Nick almost feels a chill run down his spine as he looks to his left and sees Louis Tomlinson, his personal assistant and very own satan, sitting back in his chair with his legs on top of his desk. Louis looks absolutely delighted to be awake at 8 AM on a Monday. Nick can’t stand him.

"Don’t know why you’re calling me Mr. Grimshaw when you’ve been referring to me by numerous expletives since you started. Where were these manners when I introduced myself to you and you laughed in my face?"

It’s very disarming that Louis’s attractive, mostly because no matter how nice his smile is, it usually belies a more nefarious motive. He’s right when Louis opens his mouth and says, "I was a bit distracted by your hair at the time, wondering if it was overcompensating for some other department you might be lacking in."

Nick doesn't say anything else for fear of maybe breaking Louis' neck, so he makes a mental note to loosen the screws on Louis’ chair later. He’s hoping that the next time Louis sits down on it, he’ll possibly fall when he tries to lean back on it and maybe have to take a couple sick days. When he rushes into his office, he can still feel Louis’ eyes burning into his back, and he’s not sure if that’s a good feeling or not yet.

He texts _Please kill the Tomlinson child_ to Aimee as soon as he's slouched down in his chair. It's only 8:04 in the morning, and he's already exhausted. He can't catch any breaks, he thinks, as he hears his door knob rattling. He's just about ready to tell Louis to get out of his office when Aimee swings the door open and closes it just as fast.

"I can't actually commit murder today." Grinning, she sits down in the chair in front of his desk. "I'm on a tight schedule. What did he do now?"

"Nothing yet, but just not knowing what he has planned makes me tired."

“You do look a bit tired. Long night?”

Nick gives her a long look. “I _may_ have went out last night. Possibly brought someone home. I feel bad, you know, kicking people out at half seven in the morning when they’ve went to bed at around, say, 4 AM.”

“I did see it on Instagram, you know.” Nick does know. He got the notification that she liked it this morning. He’s got to have a bit of a talk with her, using her phone and all while she’s supposed to be on the job. Then again, he doesn’t really have much of a leg to stand on, and  if he wants to keep his private bits, he can let any lecturing he has in mind slide. Aimee’s a bit terrifying.

“Well, I mean, he certainly understood. I drove him back to his own flat, and he just told me to give him a call later. But, I mean, he’ll be here at the office later this week for some meetings before the photoshoot.”

“ _Another_ model?” Aimee asks with an exaggerated sigh and when Nick nods, she just laughs. “By the way, I sent you some emails regarding the layout if you’d want to look at them? They should be the most recent ones.”

Good thing Aimee reminded him about doing actual work. He's probably got at least thirteen emails to answer before 9, so he turns to his computer and _oh_. Oh god. 

"What's wrong?" Aimee asks, leaning forward to get a look at his computer. There are naked men _everywhere_.

"When did he even find the time to do this?!" Nick asks, turning the screen around, so Aimee can see from across the desk, “but there it is. My screen saver. It's 8:15 AM, and there's just dicks all over my screen."

"You like it, yeah?" he hears another voice, and again, it's just the voice he doesn't want to hear. Louis parades across Nick's office and plants himself at Nick's side, studying the screen carefully. "I think that one's the fittest," he says, pointing to one guy _that kind of looks like Nick?_ He's carefully trying not to think about it.

"When did you do this?" Nick asks and looks at Aimee like he's amazed or something. She gives him an eyebrow raise, and he knows, okay, he knows that things like this happen with Louis all the time.

Louis just shrugs. "Here are your appointments for the day. The one you had at 9:30 cancelled for some reason. I wasn't listening, I was playing Solitaire, but here are the rest." They’re written on a bunch of lime green Post-it notes instead of the appointment book that Nick leaves for Louis in his top right desk drawer.

This is about the point where Aimee gets up and leaves.

"Where's my appointment book?" Nick asks as Louis is taking the seat that Aimee just vacated. He slouches down quickly, putting his right foot up on Nick’s desk and crossing his arms.  

"Oh, I gave it to Harry, the new intern, because he was complaining to me about something. I told him it was a diary. He’s a nice boy and all, but I’ve got more important things to do," Louis shrugs, tilting his head toward Nick’s computer screen and raising both eyebrows.

Unbelievable.

“You’re useless.” Thinking the conversation is over, he’s turning his computer screen back to him and logging into his email account and the company website. Louis is still there, though, and Nick can feel his eyes burning into the side of his face. “See something you like, Tomlinson? Perhaps taking a picture would be better?”

He hears an annoyed huff come from Louis. “Saw your Instagram post this morning,” is all he says. Wonderful.

“My instagram is on private. How are you following me?” 

Instead of answering, Louis opts for reaching forward and taking a few of the Post-It notes he had left there before, flipping through each one. “What are you doing?”

Louis shrugs. “Just seeing when you’re not going to be around the office today, that’s all. I’ve got things to do today. Big plans for you, Nick, big plans.” With a hint of a grin, Louis is  up and out of the office before Nick can utter a single word of protest.

\---

The day goes about as well as expected. Louis hasn’t stopped bothering him once today, and it’s really grating on Nick’s nerves. Every time his phone rings, Nick’s fist clench before he hears the speaker, and the second Louis’ voice chimes out from the answering machine, he hangs up. At least it’s consistent with Louis’ behavior every Monday, though, since he knows that Mondays are Nick’s least favorite days. It's finally, _finally_ half past two, and Nick tells everyone in the office that he's taking an hour lunch instead of the usual 45 minutes because he's done so much already.  "Oh my god, you must be exhausted," Louis says as Nick is putting on his coat, "do you need me to carry you to your car? How about someone to hold your umbrella, so your hair doesn't get wet? Will you be alright to drive?" Nick pretends to ignore him as he walks out the door.

He texts Aimee a simple _Kill him_ on his way down to his car.

\---

"You will never guess what Louis set my screensaver to this morning," Nick says the second he sits down with Henry at some restaurant a couple blocks away from his office. "It was total porn. No censorship or anything. 

"Are we really talking about him?"

"Absolutely not," he says, shaking his head, "I don't want to talk about Louis for the hour that I don't have to deal with him. I'm just saying, that screen saver was atrocious. I swear to god, Henry, it's like he stays after work every day for the sole purpose of making my life miserable."

"Just fuck him," Henry states, bluntly, and Nick laughs. "Yeah, really, fuck him," he agrees, but Henry shakes his head. "No, I mean actually shag him."

Nick is confused.

Henry shrugs. "I'm just saying, we both know you're into him," he pauses to raise an eyebrow at Nick, and it's not like Nick's _arguing_ , "and obviously the kid's got a lot of energy. Just like, put all of that extra effort he uses into a truly energetic fuck."

"That would be a good suggestion, but I don’t shag my coworkers, Henry," Nick argues, and Henry just looks at him with a dead stare. "Models don't count. They don't work for me," he adds as an afterthought.

Henry simply shrugs, but he doesn't look like he agrees. Nick goes about eating again, and it's a nice, peaceful quiet for the rest of the hour.

\---

Nick sneaks into his office without anyone noticing, really. It's quiet and everyone is working and he's surprised to see that Louis, even, is too focused on what he's doing at his desk to look up and see Nick.

Once he's in his office, though, he understands why everyone was so quiet. He has thirty-five new emails. Thirty-five. This job is too stressful. He's starting to think that maybe a fashion editor was not the best choice for him. Perhaps maybe a butcher at a grocery store would have helped him take out a bit more anger than just his usual aggressive keyboard typing. He hears his door open and doesn’t even bother to look up to see who it is. If they just let themselves in without knocking, Nick would bet a lot of money on it being Aimee. 

"Did you hide the body yet?" he's asking as he swivels his chair around to the printer, diligently waiting for the applications for some open spots in the office to print. 

"What do you get up into your spare time, Grimshaw?" Oh _no_.  Nick wasn’t anticipating this. Louis is standing in the doorway, his hip cocked to the side, and he has his arms crossed, just waiting for an answer. When he doesn't get one, he relaxes his pose a bit and sighs. "I'm just here to tell you that your little one hour lunch stint almost, _almost_ had me caring about this job. Your meeting with Mr. Shay is in ten minutes. I’m not sure if you’ll have time to hide the body before then, though."

"I've got it, don't worry. While I'm in the meeting though, would you mind showing Harry some of the work he's supposed to be doing? He keeps trying to show me his fashion designs, and I don't have the heart to tell him that's not what he'll be doing here. You're heartless, though, perfect for breaking the news to him."  Nick is so proud of himself. “Also, I need you to go upstairs to print out the new business cards I had to order by myself, absolutely no thanks to you. They’ll have them in by the time I’m done with the meeting. Mr. Shay always requests a business card from me, for some odd reason. So if you could come through for me this once and actually do your job, I’ll give you some sort of sticker or something. You know, as a thank you.”

Louis just sort of sneers at him and closes Nick's door without another word. Nick sighs and figures he should probably get the presentation room set up for when Mr. Shay arrives.

\--- 

It takes over an hour, but Nick thinks that Mr. Shay is really, really happy with the layout. He’s standing in for Mr. Ben Cooper, Nick’s real boss, for the month. He’s a pretty laid back guy when everything’s going according to plan, but Nick absolutely cannot wait until Mr. Shay leaves since Nick knows how to pick apart Mr. Cooper’s reactions. That aside though, Mr. Shay does really look happy with what Nick’s put together. He better be since he worked hard for the past three weeks on it. The _Fashion UK_ Christmas issue is by far the most stressful out of the whole year, and Nick's not settling for anything less than perfect. It'll be nice, he thinks, to not have to work on anything but the office Christmas Party until after the holidays. 

"Can I take one of your business cards, Mr. Grimshaw?" Mr. Shay is asking him, and Nick gets straight out of his seat. It's an easy enough task. 

"Of course! Give me just a second, and I'll grab one from my office."

"Hey Louis, did you pick up my business cards?" Nick asks, and Louis shrugs from his desk. "Should be next to your computer," he tells Nick. And they are, indeed. Except instead of **NICK GRIMSHAW: FASHION EDITOR** , his cards read, in Comic Sans size 15, **NICK GRIMSHAW: PROFESSIONAL HITMAN**.

He's going to kill Louis.

"I apologize, Mr. Shay, but I don't have any on me. It seems I've run out," he is explaining the moment he steps foot in the presentation room again. "I can write down my contact info, and we can go from there? This is so unprofessional of me, and I apologize again, but I didn't even think to stock up again."

Once Mr. Shay is finally out of the whole office, not without six more apologies from Nick, he feels like he can breathe again. "Tomlinson," he growls, pushing himself off the door, "my office. Now." 

"Oh, do you think I'm in trouble?" Louis stage-whispers to Aimee, and Nick doesn't wait to see her reaction because he's basically done with Louis’ bullshit for the day. Louis follows him into the office and stares while Nick is looking through his filing cabinet. "Gonna write me up?" He's so defiant. Nick wants to slap him, then slap him again, and then possibly kiss him. Kissing Louis is absolutely a new train of thought, one that Nick wants to investigate further, he thinks.

"Of course I am. You completely wasted company resources," Nick's exasperated as he writes down another report, for the third time today, about Louis' behavior problems.

"How am I not fired yet? You write me up, like, every day." 

"Because nobody wants your job, Louis," Nick tells him, and he can feel the air turn stiff and cold almost immediately. "I'm sending this to the boss tomorrow since I'm leaving in thirty minutes. Go back to your desk," he orders, and funnily enough, Louis goes without another word. 

Nick shoves the report into the bottom of his desk with the rest of the reports from the past three years, where it won't be seen again.

\---

Finally it's 5 PM. Almost everyone in the office packed up and left approximately ten minutes ago, and Nick thinks he's just about done with everything. The only thing he has left to worry about is the Christmas party for next week. This weekend, though, he doesn't intend to even see the outdoors until he has to come back to this place on Monday morning. Basically everyone is gone, so by ten past five,  Nick's decided to slip on his coat and head out the door too. 

Louis is still sitting at his desk when Nick's getting all his things together. "Leaving now?" he asks him, and it feels sort of…awkward, this air between them. Out of the three years he's known Louis, awkward was never one of the things that he felt around him. He’s sure that he would rather have awkward than the treatment he gets from Louis on a daily basis, though.

"Nah, I've got a bit of work to catch up on," Louis says, and his voice seems sort of distant, almost a little scratchy. Ah, work. Sometimes Nick forgets that Louis has an actual job besides the one where he makes Nick's life a living hell.

"You sure? I can give you a ride. I heard how you were telling Aimee last week that Zayn needed to borrow your car."

"M'fine." Louis hasn't turned around once. Alright then.

"Well, have a good weekend then? See you Monday," is the last thing he says to Louis, and he's on his way out the door.

\---

Nick loves Friday nights. Usually, he's more social than a night in watching the episodes of X-Factor he missed during the week, but regardless, he loves Friday nights. It's almost 11, and he's exhausted yet comfortable and relaxed. He's not sure anything could possibly ruin his night.

It's as if Louis Tomlinson knows exactly when Nick is thinking positive thoughts because as soon as Nick relaxes back into his couch, Louis’ name pops up as an incoming call on his phone. Sometimes he wonders what he did to deserve a fate so cruel.

He doesn't even get a chance to say hello before Louis is literally yelling into his ear. "Louis? I can't understand a word you're saying." Louis ignores him again and continues yelling, and Nick is about to hang up but then everything goes silent and he can hear Louis breathing heavily.

"'Lo?" Louis sounds trashed. "Nick? I think I called Nick."

"Yeah, you did. You okay?"

"M'not too sure. My friends forgot about me. I think I'm going to throw up." He states it so proudly.

"You drunk?"

"Absolutely not! That would be….totally unprofessional of me. Honestly, Grim.. _Grimshaw_ , why would you think so little of me? Also why aren’t you out? Thought I saw you here, Nick, swear to god I did. Thought it was you dancing with some guy."

Nick tries to ignore the last part in favor of thinking how plastered Louis is and how his friends forgot about him, and Nick would consider himself an awful person if he didn't help Louis get home safely. He's regretting his life as he laces his shoes up and put his jacket on, all the while entertaining Louis on the phone. “It’s a little cold out,” he listens to Louis talk, “I think I forgot my jacket inside. I can’t go in there, though, I’ll throw up." 

"Louis? Can you tell me where you are?"

"I think I'm at McGraff's pub. Niall took me and Liam there, and they both disappeared. They were supposed to cheer me up, I think? I'm not sure, but I'm used to it. I can walk home. I just need to sit down, I think, and maybe throw up," he hiccups into the phone.

"I'm already halfway there, Louis, please just stay where you are. Actually, stay on the line with me. Louis? Louis." He hears some light snoring on the other line as he starts his car. "Louis wake up."

"I'm _awake_ , Nick," he grumbles, and Nick rolls his eyes. As long as he's conscious.

"You at the front entrance or the side, love?" Nick asks softly, and this is so opposite from how he usually acts toward Louis, but Louis sounds really upset, and he's not sure where his friends are, and Nick's heart is _hurting_.

"Side. There's no one over here, so I'm going to throw up now." Nick tears the phone away from his ear as he parks because that is definitely the sound of Louis throwing up.

He hangs up, though, when he sees Louis, and he rushes over, water bottle in hand, and he wonders when he became such a mum. "You alright, love?" he asks, and Louis just groans and nods, his head resting against the wall. His eyes are closed, and for the two seconds he's silent, he actually looks quite adorable. He's got long eyelashes that almost rest against his cheek, and his cheeks are a lovely, lovely rose color, and Nick wants to kiss him- but not now, obviously. Not when he's two seconds away from throwing up again. "Where are your friends at, love?"

"Inside, I think."

"Give your phone here. I'm going to send them a text," Nick says, but as Louis is reaching for his phone, two slightly dumb looking boys barge through the exit. Louis groans, and both of them practically snap their own necks when they hear him. 

"Louis, mate, we've been looking everywhere for you. What's wrong? Who's this?"

"I'm taking him home," Nick says after a moment, and the one that looks sort of like a puppy appears to be hulking up.

"Oh no, you're no-"

"This is Nick," Louis cuts him off. That seems to do something significant since puppy boy calms down immediately and the blond one has the dumbest grin Nick has honestly ever seen. They don’t say anything else, so Nick finally speaks up.

"Look, I need to take him home since he’s probably going to catch hypothermia out here. Can one of you direct me?" Nick asks, and Louis is basically hanging off of Nick's neck now. "I'm afraid if I ask Louis to direct me, he'll send me right to some murderer’s flat or something."

"Unbelievable…this is truly unbelievable," the blond, apparently Irish, one says with a laugh. 

"It's just a few blocks away. Go straight down, make a left at the light, and then it’s the first left after you turn. His is the big, white building on the right side of the road, second floor up," the other one explains. "Here's his flatmates number," he says, shoving his flip-phone in Nick's face.  He sees the name ‘Zayn Malik’ on the small screen. 

Nick thanks them and drags Louis back to his car and gets him settled in the backseat.

\---

Getting to Louis’ flat  was easy enough. What's not easy, however, is trying to lift a very unhelpful Louis out of the car. "Louis, I need some help."

"M'afraid I can't move…My legs are missing, Nick. What am I supposed to do?" he's mumbling, and Nick will kill him.

"Please just. Up. Up. There, that's it," Nick coaches him through sitting up. He hears Louis gag, but he doesn't register it fast enough because Louis is _throwing up_ on his shoes. Oh, that is disgusting.

"I am so sorry," Louis says and covers his mouth with his hand, and Nick's never heard him so apologetic. He's still a monster. After all, there's no telling if he planned this or not. 

"It's totally fine. I didn't, uh, need those anyway?" He discreetly kicks his shoes off and leaves them near the parking meter. "Let's get you upstairs." The week before Christmas is freezing cold, and now he's standing on the sidewalk in his socks. He thinks he needs to be upstairs about as much as Louis does.

When they are up on the second floor, Louis seems to be looking and talking a little better. His walk is still a bit wobbly, so Nick had to pull him up the stairs by the waist. Louis is light and, more importantly, very pliant. He never realized how much smaller Louis is compared to him. 

"This is me," Louis says, and instead of taking his keys out like a normal human being, he starts pounding on the door. Oh, so Louis being obnoxious is a universal thing. Nick feels a bit comforted by the fact that Louis doesn't _just_ do that to his office door (but also a little jealous, which has been a recent development that Nick is still trying to work on.)

A beautiful, beautiful man opens the door, and he doesn't look very surprised at all. This must be Zayn. Nick is thinking about ditching his very low-key crush on Louis and switching to Zayn when Louis says, "This is my boss, and he picked me up on his night off," and traps Nick into a literal bear hug. 

"Nick, huh?" Zayn asks and raises an eyebrow, moving aside so that Louis can wobble into the apartment. "Heard a lot about you, mate." He shakes his hand, and Nick wonders why Louis doesn't have these manners.

The sound of Louis stomping echoes through the flat, and not even two seconds later, he's trudging out with a pair of shoes and thrusting them towards Nick. "Please take these. I am so sorry about throwing up on your shoes, and I’m not lying when I say I really didn't mean that one." Nick looks from the shoes and down to his feet. He shakes his head.

"Those wouldn't fit."

"Thank god," Louis says and deflates a little. "These are my favorite pair." Nick is stupidly endeared.

"Anyways, my car's still running, so I should probably get going," Nick says, and Louis hugs him again which is weird and apologizes five more times which is really weird. "It's really alright," he says each time, "I promise."

"Thank you, Nick," Louis seems really serious, and Nick doesn't know how to react so he….squeezes Louis' shoulder. Beautiful. Zayn thanks him, and then Nick is escaping from the awkward situation as fast as possible. 

\---

The rest of the weekend is uneventful and, much to Nick's dismay, Louis-less.

\---

The first person Nick sees on Monday morning is one Harry Styles. He is holding some magazines in one hand, but in the other he's got a sketchbook. Since it’s a Monday, Nick is in absolutely no mood to see Harry's ‘innovative’ fashion ideas this morning. He pretends to ignore it and makes grabby hands for the magazines instead. Every two weeks he gets competing magazines' monthly issues sent straight to his office, strictly for research purposes, but he's also not entirely averse to free subscriptions to magazines that are usually over £7 an issue. Also in the pile there's a strange envelope. He never gets sent letters.

There's no name on it, and there's no address on it. That is particularly strange. He understands why when he opens the envelope. It's a simple piece of paper with the words "You Suck" written across the middle of it, and it looks suspiciously like Tomlinson's handwriting. "Send Louis in here on your way out, please. Thanks, Harry," Nick tells him, and he's glad he avoided Harry's sketchbook for another day.

Louis doesn't waste any time at all when he gets into Nick's office, he kicks his feet up on the desk like he’s at home or something. "How can I help you today?"

"You barf on my shoes, and this is the thanks I get?" Nick asks.

The answer Louis gives him is as snarky as Nick could’ve predicted. "Well, the smell of your cologne really tipped me over to be honest." Louis is picking at his fingernails like some sort of princess or something. Nick hates it, but he also doesn't.

"Is that all?" Louis asks, and Nick grimaces.

"Thanks so much, Nick," he says in a slightly higher voice, and then in a lower voice, "Oh, it's fine, Louis. You're so welcome. Really."

Smirking, Louis crosses his arms and leans against the doorway. “Just wait, honestly. Just wait.” Then, Louis spins, and he’s out the door.

It’s going to be a rough week by the looks of it. 

Nick has been planning some ideas of his own lately, though. Louis was ruthless last week, and Nick fell for every single one of his pranks. For example, last week Louis had put some sort of sticky liquid all over Nick’s keyboard, so when he went to type, his fingers were glued shut to the keys. When Nick yelled from his office, considering he couldn’t open the door, Louis came in, equipped with his iPhone and ready to take pictures of Nick looking angry and yelling while his hands were glued down. Embarrassingly enough, Louis got his favorite picture from that day printed and blown up, so now a framed picture of Nick yelling at him sits on his desk.

This week’ll be different. In a few hours, Louis will take his lunch, and then Nick will strike. 

\---

When 1:45 finally rolls around, Louis knocks on Nick’s door in three quick successions to signal that he is taking his lunch. Grinning, Nick digs in his desk drawer for the screwdriver he hid in there that morning.

At half past two, Nick casually leans against the doorway, peering out into the office.

When Louis comes back for lunch, he putters around his desk before sitting down. His chair collapses, and Louis falls with it. Nick waits gleefully for the office to begin laughing except three people rush to his side in aid, so now Louis is seen as the victim. While he’s getting showered with attention after standing up and complaining about a back ache, he shoots Nick a glare and then a bit of a wicked grin. As annoying as it is to see people glaring daggers at Nick, it doesn’t take away from Nick’s smugness, and he walks out of the office for his lunch with an air of confidence about him.

\--- 

When Nick returns from lunch, he’s feeling rather refreshed and ready to take on the rest of the day. He closes his office door, goes to sits down in his computer chair, but it comes apart and Nick’s falling fast to the floor. He tries to grip his desk for support, but his desk and all its contents come flying down with him.

Fucking Tomlinson.

\---

It's December 21st, and Nick and Louis have two more days to plan the annual office Christmas party on the 24th. It's the only time of the year where him and Louis actually work together really well. Louis excels at working with prices to fit the budget, and Nick's always thoroughly impressed each year. Not to mention, Louis came in wearing his glasses and his hair done in some cinnamon swirl quiff, and Nick has a slight problem with concentrating.  He also feels slightly underdressed considering how much Louis put into his own appearance today, but that is the least of his worries right now.

He's got an office phone by his side in case Mr. Brown calls, another one of the higher ups. It starts ringing, and before Nick has the chance to pick it up, Louis snatches it out of his hand. "Nick Grimshaw speaking," he answers, "how can I help you today?"

Nick tries to get the phone, but Louis bats him away. "A PDF file you said?" Louis asks, trying to ignore Nick's hands swatting at him and the _Louis, Louis, Louis_ chant in the background. Nick will kill him. "I'm afraid I can't get that to you today, Mr. Brown, as I’m just about to go down for my scheduled nap time." Nick can practically feel his employment crumbling.

"I have to write you up for that, you know," Nick says when Louis hangs up the phone. Louis rolls his eyes, and they both know the threat holds no truth to it.

"Like you do every day? Are you asking me to be surprised?" Louis has the audacity to raise his eyebrows at him. Nick wants him fired.

"My office," Nick just says and leads the way. He reaches into his filing cabinet and picks out the almost-empty pad of forms. Louis is already making himself comfy by putting his feet on Nick's desk. 

"So, Zayn," Nick begins as he starts writing out the report, "does he bat for the same team? He's single, right?" He looks up to see Louis' eyebrows scrunched together and his lips in a tight line, and he looks downright adorable trying to be mad.

"No, you’re not his type. Besides, he's taken apparently." Louis looks like he’s trying to keep his composure. He looks sternly at Nick, indicating that the conversation is over.

It’s not over for Nick, though. "Hm, what a shame," he muses, "he's, like, my perfect type." He can practically see Louis plotting to light the building on fire.

“Huh, too bad Zayn’s standards aren’t lower.” He’s tearing off a bit of the upholstery from the chair off, and Nick has half a mind to tell him to stop. "Is there anything else you need?" Louis huffs, and Nick hesitates for a moment because even if Louis does seem a bit angry, he still likes spending time with him.

"No," he ends up saying, "I think that's it. Thanks."

He waits until Louis has officially left the room and the door is closed before he deposits the write-up into his drawer. There’s papers sticking out the side when he opens it, and he makes a mental note to himself to get something bigger to store them in since throwing them out appears not to be an option for Nick.

\---

It's 5:00 PM, and everyone's leaving the office now, but Nick's still got a bit of work left to do on top of planning the actual party. His office door is open, so Aimee peeks her head in. "You coming?" she asks as she puts her coat on.

"No, I can't tonight," Nick says, not looking away from his computer. "I've got to get next month's spread started, then I suppose planning the Christmas party doesn't seem like a bad idea." He's so tired, and he wishes he could go home.

"Alright, love, don't work too hard," Aimee tells him with a small laugh and then she's on her way.

"You staying?" Nick hears the gremlin ask as he passes by Nick's office. "It's 5," Louis points out as if that's not already obvious to Nick. 

"I've got a lot of work to do. Not to mention I've got to finish planning the Christmas party," Nick says and sort of waves his hand like he's trying to get Louis to shoo. Louis looks a little concerned. It's kind of heartwarming. "I'll be alright. Honestly, Louis, you've never looked so worried before in your life." 

Louis looks considering for a moment, and Nick (hopefully) thinks he might stay, but then Louis is shrugging on his jacket and leaving without another word.

Ah, peace and quiet. Sometimes Nick loves being the only person in the office because it's such a drastic difference to seeing how completely crazy it is during the day, but this is not one of those times. He could really use a nap, maybe ten, but he's at least planning on being here until 7 or 8. He figures a fifteen minute power nap couldn't hurt, so he rests his forehead on the desk with closed eyes and tries to even out his breathing.

It hasn’t yet been ten minutes when Nick hears the main door of the office opening, and he'd pretend to be more alert if he wasn't so tired. Someone probably forgot something, is all.

"I'm back," he hears a voice say and a paper bag being dropped on my desk. It sounds suspiciously like Louis.  He looks up, and to his surprise, it is and he's holding two large McDonald’s drinks in his hands and there's a McDonald’s bag on Nick's desk. It smells delicious.

"I remember you saying you liked Big Macs best, yeah?" Louis asks and plops down in the seat across from Nick. "Figured we're gonna be here for a while, so might as well get some dinner."

This is so nice. They're eating in a comfortable silence, and Nick doesn't remember a time he didn't feel on-edge with Louis around. The lights are a bit dimmed, and Nick feels like the only thing that would finish setting off the mood would be a nice scented candle in between them.

"Did you poison me or is this a date? Are you seducing me, Louis Tomlinson?" he asks, mostly joking, and watches Louis' cheeks flame. "I've got to tell you, this Big Mac is definitely closing the deal."

Louis is flushed, and Nick didn't expect that reaction, but he'll take it. Louis is about to retort but then his phone's ringing. He looks down at the screen, and his face absolutely lights up. "Excuse me for a second," Louis says and stands up from the chair. Nick feels his entire body turn to liquid while Louis answers his phone with the biggest smile on his face. He keeps walking until he is well out of the room, and Nick doesn’t even bother trying to listen. Maybe he’s a little jealous. He never even entertained the thought about Louis having a significant other, but right now he’s seething at the way Louis’ face lit up and the way he had to physically leave the room so he could probably jerk off over the phone.

God, who would even want to date that monster? Well, Nick. The answer is Nick.

He takes out his anger on his keyboard, aggressively typing in _Bake cookies for party_ on his list. Louis is taking a long time (well, like five minutes) on the phone, and Nick gets angrier every second. When Louis finally comes back, he sits down in his chair and sighs happily. Nick almost breaks his mouse from the way he’s clutching so hard. “Girlfriend?” he asks, pseudo casual. 

Louis lets out a laugh like that’s the most outrageous thing anyone’s ever said. “Me? Girlfriend? You’re serious? Oh my god.”

“Fine, sorry,” Nick snarls. “Boyfriend?”

Louis shakes his head again. “Nah, just my little sister. She usually calls around this time on Mondays.”

Nick’s eyebrow quirks up. He had no idea Louis even had a sister. “You close with her then? What about the rest of your family?”

Louis looks kind of wary when Nick looks at him. He’s probably afraid Nick is trying to stockpile some information to use against him later. Nick wishes that were the case, rather than him genuinely wanting to know more about Louis.

“Yeah, we’re all pretty close,” Louis says offhandedly. “They live about 2 hours away by train, so I never get to see them.”

“You’re going home for Christmas, though, yeah?”

Louis’ face drops, and he shakes his head. “I’m a bit broke at the mo’, so I won’t be up there anytime soon.” 

“That’s a shame. Sorry to hear that.”

“It’s alright, I think. My sisters are probably a bit tired of me,” he says and perks up. “I always had to watch them while my mum was at work, so. They’re getting a nice break from my voice.” 

Nick doesn’t like how self-deprecating Louis sounds, so he just decides to ignore that. “Oh yeah? Never interfered with your university?”

Louis just shrugs. “Never went to uni.” _Hm._

“Well, it isn’t always for some people, yeah? I probably wouldn’t have gone if my parents didn’t offer to pay my tuition to be quite honest.” 

“Oh, I wanted to go.” Nick’s face blanches at the flat tone Louis’ voice adopted. “I didn’t have the money at first, so I got a job to save up for the next year. Then I _still_ couldn’t afford it, so I took on another job. Now I’m 22, still broke, and still no uni.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Nick says. Louis just shakes his head.

They’re sitting in silence for about two minutes, and Nick opens his mouth to talk, but Louis cuts him off straight away. “Are we done here? I think we’re done.” His eyebrows are set in a flat line and his arms are crossed with his back stiff. He takes their McDonald’s bags and deposits them on his way out, but he leaves without saying another word to Nick.

The thing is, Nick knows he fucked up somewhere in that conversation, but he just doesn’t know exactly where.

\---

Tuesday, without a doubt, is Nick’s second least favorite day of the week.

At approximately five past noon on every Tuesday since he’s started, Harry the intern waddles his way into Nick’s office to discuss new designs he’s been thinking up. Nick really, really doesn’t have the heart to tell Harry that _no, that’s not in his job description_ , so here he is, pushing all his other appointments aside to make time for a one hour appointment with Harry.

“So I really wanted to show you some scarves I’ve been working on,” is the first thing Harry says after her barges into Nick’s office and pushes a coffee he purchased for Nick across the desk. Harry always brings him the sweetest coffee Nick’s ever tasted which is a complete contrast to the black coffee that Louis brings him every morning. (“It’s almost as bitter as you are,” Louis told him the first time he ever made it but was extremely displeased when Nick retorted, “I love black coffee.”) “Here are some figure eights,” he says as he shoves his journal (Nick’s old planner) into Nick’s face, “they’re also thin enough to be a head wrap, which I love. Here are some thicker ones I drew too. More practical for this weather, I guess.” Nick doesn’t really know what to say, so he doesn’t say anything.

“Thanks for entertaining me with this stuff,” Harry says after another moment of silence, and Nick looks up to see a sad smile on his face. Damnit, this look is exactly what he’d been trying to prevent. “I know this isn’t what I’m supposed to be doing here, but I really appreciate you listening to me go on and on about it.”

Harry actually looks like somebody kicked his puppy and then stole it. Oh God. _Oh God_. Nick knows he has to do something now. “Can I borrow this real quick?” he’s asking as he takes the book out of Harry’s hands. “So I can have Louis photocopy some stuff?” He doesn’t even wait for an answer before he’s paging Louis.

“What,” Louis answers flatly.

“Hello sunshine, I need you in my office real quick. Thank you,” Nick says in a sweet voice, and he hears Louis groan before hanging up. Harry’s been repeating “you really, really don’t need to do this,” but Nick just waves him off.

“Hey, what’s that?” Harry points out Nick’s newest addition to his desk.

“It’s a safe.” A stupid, heavy safe to keep all the write-ups that Nick’s given Louis in the past three years but never submitted. It’s even got a lock on it with a personalized password, so Louis can’t get his grubby hands into it.

It’s a bit dramatic, but Nick’s sure that if Louis ever found out about the contents of the safe, Nick would be the laughing stock of the office and maybe the whole country. He’d have to start his life over in the French countryside.

“What’s in it?” Ugh. Nick turns around to see Louis leaning against the doorway, and he is pointedly not looking at the skin-tight pants Louis is wearing today.

“Christ, Louis, are those _jeggings_?” Nick asks, partially to distract Louis from his previous question, but mostly because he’s actually really curious.

“No?” Louis asks as he looks down at his pants. “They’ve got some give to them, especially in the front,” he says, and he’s grabbing his crotch. _Oh my god_. Nick has to remind himself ten times over that he is a professional. He closes his eyes to avoid watching Louis feeling himself up. This is awful.

“Louis, please photocopy these,” Nick’s saying and flailing the journal with one hand and the other covered over his eyes. “Stop groping yourself and photocopy these. All of them.” 

Nick doesn’t remove his hand from his eyes until he hears his office door click and he knows Louis is gone. Harry, however, is still sitting on the chair opposite him with significantly redder cheeks but a shit-eating grin on his face. “So, Louis?” he asks in a smug tone, and Nick groans. 

“No,” Nick says and proceeds to repeat the word fifteen more times for good measure. “He is a _monster_ , Harry, so stop what you’re thinking. Immediately.”

“I’m just saying,” Harry says and leans back with his hands clasped behind his head, “I’ve never seen someone so focused on keeping their eyes waist-above. You didn’t even blink once.” Nick’s face is stoic. He doesn’t like this smug attitude Harry’s got around him now that he finally has a little inside scoop on Nick. Christ, he wasn’t even being that obvious.

“Please, don’t tell him,” Nick says quietly, figuring that denying it would make him look much sillier than he already feels, what with his stupid ever-growing crush on his assistant.

“I would never,” Harry says and pulls his hands into his lap, looking dreadfully earnest. “You can’t really choose who you like, yeah? Louis isn’t that bad of a choice anyways.” 

“Last year, before I went into a meeting, I had mentioned to Louis that I was thinking about trading my black iPhone for the new white one. When I came back into my office and got my phone from the drawer, I found that he had painted it white with liquid paper.” 

“Well, he’s still cute, right?”

“Two months ago, I was going into the one of the most important meetings of my career. I had to create a huge PowerPoint and present it to my bosses and everything. When I logged onto my account to pull up the presentation, all that was saved there was a video that Louis took in Photobooth, looking bored while that rollercoaster backdrop was playing.”

“And you weren’t fired?” Harrys asks.

“I asked them to give me a minute and walked out of the presentation room ready to skin him alive. He was standing there with a flash drive as if I was the one that was in the wrong.”

Harry’s silent, probably afraid Nick’s going to have another outburst. He’s absolutely correct.

“Just last week, I came into work, logged onto my computer, and looked into my personal photos folder and saw that Louis had photoshopped the same picture of Justin Bieber into _every single picture_ and then deleted my originals. Every personal photo I have now has Justin Bieber in it.”

“That took me forever. Do you realize how many photoshop tutorials I had to watch in order to get it perfect?” Louis walks right in, holding Harry’s journal in one hand and a stack of papers in the other. “Here, I actually did what you asked this time. Only because I like Harry,” Louis says with a wink directed toward Harry. “Anyways, I’m going on my lunch.” 

“Oh yeah, you must be tired from all this strenuous photocopying you did. That’s a first, yeah?” Nick says, and Louis completely ignores him on his way out.

If Louis notices that Nick seems a bit nicer toward him for the rest of the week considering Louis has been a bit down, he absolutely does not mention it.

\----

On Friday afternoon, Nick’s feeling really generous. It’s the day before Christmas, tonight’s the office party, and he feels a bit reckless. Since he has no appointments for the day, he figures that now’s a good time as any to take an hour lunch and make a trip down to the train station.

After he tells a strangely distant Louis that he’s taking an hour lunch, he shrugs his coat on and grabs his car keys from the holder outside his office door. Nick’s already ordered the tickets for both ways online, which came to about £170.00 total, and now he’s just got to go pick them up.

His stomach has been slightly uneasy all day. This whole doing nice stuff for Louis thing is really kicking his arse as far as he’s concerned, but he’s also weirdly excited to see the look on Louis’ face when he realizes that he’ll actually able to see his family for Christmas.

This weird butterfly feeling doesn’t settle when Nick picks up the tickets, but it doesn’t stop when he gets back to the office, and it certainly doesn’t stop when he and Louis are setting up the office after work.

\---

 

Everything is going smoothly, and Nick’s really happy about it. Planning for this party has been a bit stressful but not as much since Nick finished with the December/January issue. 

The office looks like it vomited red and green with the streamers and the Christmas banners hanging up everywhere. The big Christmas tree in the corner definitely adds to the decoration; there’s no ornaments on the tree, but the tinsel wrapped around it and the star on top make up for it. The budget wasn’t large enough to hire a Santa or rent a suit, so Nick spent the last of the money buying individual Santa hats for everyone. At any point in time when someone isn’t wearing one, Nick shoots them a steady glare until they bashfully put it on.

Nick has a playlist going with songs that he carefully picked out himself, and people have been complimenting him constantly on it all night by telling him that he should have been a radio host or something of that sort. 

As stated before, Nick thinks everything’s going along smoothly, but there is one thing, though, and that’s the lack of noise coming from Louis. He’s in the middle of a conversation when he realizes hasn’t seen Louis in over an hour and a half.

“I’m sorry,” he cuts Aimee off accidentally and recoils from the dirty look she gives him, “but have you seen Louis? Has he just ditched the Christmas party I planned when it was _his_ job?”

Aimee just sort of motions to the front of the office where Louis is walking around, and he’s holding two paper bags, and Nick is going to kill him. Louis looks so happy to be here, surrounded by a couple of the other workers in the office, and taking out three huge handles of vodka, even though there was a _strict_ no alcohol rule given to Nick by the higher-ups. Louis is offering it to everyone freely and pouring it into people’s glasses as Nick stomps over to him.

“Did you not hear me when I told you _three_ times no alcohol?” Nick growls, but Louis ignores him by taking a shot with Harry, who’s looking at Nick with apologetic eyes as he swallows it down. That could possibly just be a look of regret for his inevitable hangover the next morning, though. Nick’s not too sure.

Nick takes a deep breath. Two hours to go until he can go back to his flat and revel in the peace and quiet.

“Everyone, I have an announcement,” Louis yells a bit later, while standing on a desk and nearly kicking over a computer. “I demand that Nick Grimshaw take one shot with me.” The drunken majority of the office cheers and Nick just covers his face. “I even prepared a song,” Louis says as he tosses Nick’s iPod to the side and plugs in his own phone. “Shots” by LMFAO starts playing, and next thing Nick knows, Louis is dragging him over to the table where there are red and green plastic shot glasses scattered everywhere and all he can think about is that he’s going to have to clean this all up. Mary from the floor upstairs already vomited in the corner and was sent home by taxi, and there’s food crushed into the nasty carpet, but thankfully nobody has passed out yet.

“Alright Grimshaw, you ready?” Louis asks, and Nick shrugs. He probably could use a bit of a drink to get through the rest of the night.

Louis pours Nick a shot and one for himself and loops his arm with Nick’s after they’ve both got their glasses stable in their hands. “One, two, three.” Nick feels it sliding down his throat, and he doesn’t think he’ll ever not hate the taste of vodka, the way it burns when it goes down, and the way it burns when it’s settling in his stomach. 

“Thanks,” Louis says and winks at him, then scampers off to go be the social butterfly that drunk Louis Tomlinson apparently is.

The party’s almost over, though. Thank God.

\--- 

The clean up is atrocious. Nick had to send three people home by cab because they were too drunk to even consider driving home. He’s pumped people full of water before they left, even though mostly everyone was sober by the time the party was over. Hopefully word doesn’t get to his boss, or else Nick’s arse will definitely be on the line.

There’s only two people left in the office, him and Louis. Nick’s already drenched the carpet in cleaner about three times and scrubbed it until his fingers became raw. There’s still so much to do, like package the food and throw away the rest of the garbage and take the decorations down. Louis, as usual, is sitting there doing nothing. He’s leaning against the table with his arms crossed, just watching Nick quietly. It pisses Nick off more than it really should.

“Louis, for once in your goddamn life, can you help clean up the mess you’ve made?” Nick thinks he can practically see Louis wince from the anger in his voice. “Or do you just not care at all? Honestly.”

It’s silent for a moment, but Nick can practically feel the room heating up with how angry Louis is.

“Sorry for fucking breathing, honestly, Nick. I was just trying to have some fun on my birthday, considering all my friends ditched me and I had to spend this miserable day with you and the rest of the office that I hardly even know. God forbid I do that, yeah?” Birthday? How did Nick not know? His eyes are following as Louis sweeps across to the alcohol table and stuffs all the used cups and shot glasses angrily into the trash bag as he’s yelling. “I spend five days a week literally serving you. Do you know how degrading that feels sometimes? The fact that I am a 22 year old, grown man and getting paid to run errands constantly for an ungrateful, _miserable twat_ whose _daddy_ paid for their schooling. And you know what? No, no I literally couldn’t give less of a shit about this, Nick. I don’t care about cleaning up, I don’t care about my job, I just do not care.” 

Nick is somewhat shocked, quite frankly. Once he gets past the birthday bit, the rest of what Louis is saying finally registers and he can feel himself tensing up. “Do you know how fucking difficult you are to deal with? Day in and day out I honestly dread coming into work to see what fucking schemes you’ve pulled for the day. And me? Miserable? Have you looked in a mirror lately, Louis? It’s not my fault that you couldn’t afford to go to university. Surprisingly, Louis, you can be held accountable for your own fucking mistakes sometimes. I know it might come as a shock to you, so sit down if you really fucking need to. You’re 22 years old and so what? You didn’t go to university like the rest of your friends did. These are the cards you’ve been dealt, so how about instead of feeling sorry for yourself all the goddamn time, how about you make the best with what you’re given? God forbid you have enough money to eat and pay rent, how fucking horrible it mu-” Nick has a lot more to say, but he physically can’t anymore. Louis has got a hold of his shirt and he’s backing him up into the wall, looking like he’s about to eat him alive. Surprisingly though, instead of pain, Nick feels a pair of chapped lips against his own, and it’s like all the tension seeps out of his body.

For as aggressive as Louis Tomlinson is, he’s actually a gentle kisser. As soon as the shock of _Louis kissing him_ falls away, Louis lets Nick take over, and his body sinks right into the wall when he turns them around and pins Louis to the wall. 

This is all Nick has wanted for _months_. Louis tastes like a mix of fruit punch and sugar cookie, and just beneath that, maybe a hint of just plain old Louis. Nick loves it. 

“God,” Louis says when he breaks apart for a bit of air, “I’m so fucking drunk.” Oh. He’s drunk, that’s all this is. While Nick was bracing himself for some sort of punch or snide remark, he certainly wasn’t ready to feel his heart sink down into his stomach. He backs away from Louis, pretending like his heart isn’t getting stomped on. Louis smiles up at him, and it’s all he can do to muster up a smile back. It’s like the kiss is all but forgotten in Louis’ drunken conscious.

“You need a ride home?” he asks after he finally, finally gets all of the stuff in the garbage. The office looks as good as new again.

“If you don’t mind?” Louis’ voice is quiet. It’s all Nick wanted before but now he doesn’t really like it.

Nick really does mind, but he just shakes his head. “Of course I don’t, c’mon.”

\---

“You going home for the weekend?” Nick asks as he turns onto Louis’ block. There’s a bit of snow coming down now, and on any other day Nick would be mildly annoyed, but it’s Christmas so he’s trying to be happy and he’s trying to ignore the fact that he feels a bit rejected from the kiss before. The train tickets are practically burning a hole in his coat pocket. Any second now, they’ll be pulling up to the curb next to Louis’ apartment complex and he’ll be able to finally reveal what he’s been hiding all week. Louis appears to seem a little sober now, which is a very good thing since he’ll have to wake up early to catch the train.

“Nah,” Louis says and Nick sees him shake his head out of the corner of his eye, “thought we talked about this? Landlord raised the rent this month, so I wasn’t able to budget correctly. Life, you know.”

Nick is silent until they actually do reach the curb, and Louis is about to unbuckle his seat belt and get out of the car when Nick stops him. “I uh, got you something for Christmas. And your birthday too, I guess, since I didn’t know about it until tonight.”

Louis lets out an awkward laugh, unbuckling the belt so he can turn sideways to look at Nick. “You didn’t have to get me anything, you know. I didn’t mean to say it was my birthday so you’d feel bad for me. Wasn’t my intention at all.” Nick knows.

“I uh, may have gotten these on Tuesday.” He reaches into his coat pocket and pulls out a blank envelope. He hands it over to Louis and watches him closely. At first he’s perplexed, because the envelope is blank and it doesn’t feel like there’s much in it, but the second he opens it and peeks inside, the realization dawns on his face.

“Holy shit, Nick,” he says at first, pulling the two tickets out of the envelope and reading them closely. “You...you bought me tickets to see my family.”

“I did.” The butterflies in his stomach are going crazy again.

“I...This return ticket says next Sunday? Nick, I can’t take a whole week off of work.”

Nick shakes his head. “I covered it with the boss. Paid vacation time and everything.”

Louis drops the tickets into his lap and covers his face with his hands. “I can’t believe you did this for me,” he’s saying and peeking through the cracks in his fingers. Nick might possibly see a tear run down his face when he removes his hands, but he’s not planning on saying anything. Louis makes sure the tickets are put safely back in the envelope before he’s launching himself over the center console and attacking Nick in a gigantic hug.

He’s fully seated in Nick’s lap, which is a bit awkward, but his face is only about a centimeter away from Nick’s and he breathes out a bit, then closes his eyes. “How mad would it be if I kissed you right now?”

Nick exhales, then, “if it were mad, I’d be just as crazy as you.” It’s perfect.

Twenty minutes later, when Nick’s in his own bed nestled under the covers, his lips still tingling, his phone lights up with a new text message.

_i guess you’re not as bad as i think. thank you. - louis xx_

When he finally closes his eyes, it’s the most relaxing sleep he’s gotten in months.

\---

Asking Harry to be his temporary assistant while Louis is away with his family is probably in the top ten list of worst things Nick has ever done. Harry’s good at everything Nick asks him to do, which are simple tasks like running for coffee, getting photocopies, and scheduling appointments, but every second Nick has something resembling downtime, Harry’s there and ready to talk about feelings. Nick hates it. After making him retell the story about fifty times, Harry sighs dreamily. “Are you guys dating now?” he asks and Nick just shakes his head, his back turned to Harry in favor of searching for something in the bookcase.

“Don’t think so.”

Nick’s phone buzzes. Harry reaches fast and grabs it first. “It’s Louis. This is so great.” Louis has been texting Nick almost constantly since he left, and normally Nick is just awful at texting but texting Louis is really, really easy and he finds himself almost always waiting in anticipation for the next text.

“You and Louis are like something out of a movie,” Harry and lets out another sigh while sinking down into the chair. “I swear, is Nicholas Sparks writing this right now? I’m so happy I’m here to be the cool, encouraging friend.”

It’s true, though, Harry’s become somewhat sort of a friend to Nick after the whole designs debacle. Harry’s just a really sweet guy, in Nick’s opinion, and he cannot recall a time he ever heard Harry badmouth somebody. There’s one thing that Harry has that Nick really values, however, and it’s his inside scoop on Louis Tomlinson.

“Did he say anything about me when you talked to him?” Nick asks sort-of nonchalantly, looking through a drawer in his filing cabinet to act busy and also partially so he doesn’t have to see Harry’s face.

“Oh, sure, loads,” Harry says and Nick freezes up a bit. “Like, ‘Nick this, Nick that. I should take this back and tell him to return the tickets. Wait, they’re nonrefundable. That was so nice. Nick’s great sometimes. This is the nicest thing anyone’s ever done for me’, sort of stuff. He talked my ear off about it, and I couldn’t say like ‘yeah, now kiss ‘im’. Or, or something like, ‘hey, Nick’s got at least a year’s worth of your write-ups sitting in his safe in his office’.” Nick can already picture it- the smug look on Harry’s face. He’s got to hand it to him, though. For as clueless as the boy looks 99% of the time, he’s actually pretty good at observing people.

“I do not know what you’re talking about, Harold. I don’t have anything pertaining to Louis in there.” Cool, calm, and collective Nick.

“C’mon, Nick, I saw it last week when you wrote him up because he spiked your coffee.”

“Fine, Harry, yes. Those are his write-ups. I don’t send them in because I’m actually like...a good person and I don’t want to see him fired.”

Harry narrows his eyes. “You only don’t want to see him fired because you have a _massive crush_ on him.”

Nick’s silent for a second. “Harry, can you please go get those photocopies that I asked you to?”

Harry’s laughing at him as he leaves the office, and Nick can even hear him laughing all the way down the hall.

Surprisingly, for the whole week, Harry’s pretty hush-hush about Louis. When he and Nick actually have things to talk about other than Nick’s current (nonexistent) love life, Harry’s actually pretty lovely to talk to. Harry talks mostly about his family and this guy he’s somewhat seeing, an artist who does freelance modeling sometimes and he lets Harry practice his photography skills on him. He talks about how he’d love to be a fashion designer or a fashion photographer, and how his mother supported him through university (“Don’t tell Louis that,” Nick remarks.), and Nick’s just so endeared by Harry Styles. He doesn’t think he’s ever met a more well-rounded person in his life.

\--- 

A four day weekend, finally. Nick loves the fact that he works for a fashion magazine, where New Year’s is a bigger deal than any other holiday combined, so he now has a four day weekend. It’s a nice break, really. It’s 5:30 on Wednesday and Nick’s driving himself and Harry to his apartment for a nice dinner and a movie night. Another nice thing: him and Harry have quite similar tastes in everything.

“Hopefully your cabinet’s stocked,” Harry’s saying while he toes off his shoes and makes his own way into Nick’s kitchen, “because I’m teaching you how to cook. That’s disgusting, living off McDonalds like that. Also, how are you supposed to ‘woo’ Louis? A Big Mac?” Nick has always figured that Louis would probably enjoy the sentiment, but when Harry says it out loud it sounds sort of embarrassing.

“Fine, Nigella, show me how to boil pasta noodles.”

It’s ten minutes later and Harry’s standing super close to him, showing him how to cut tomatoes the proper way (Nick didn’t know there was a ‘proper way’), and Nick wishes he had some sort of desire or something to just turn and kiss Harry.

He doesn’t even realize he’s staring at him until Harry stops cutting the tomatoes and gives Nick a weird look. “What are you staring for? You’re supposed to be looking at the tomatoes, not me.”

Nick shakes himself out of his reverie. “No it’s just...I wish I’d fallen in love with you instead, you know?” Harry’s mouth drops open into a semi-shocked but mostly huge grin, and he’s _laughing_ at Nick like this is funny. This is not funny at all, this falling in love with Louis thing.

And fuck, he didn’t even realize that he used the word ‘love’. “No, no, no. I don’t mean that. That’s awful and I absolutely take it back,” Nick’s trying to say over Harry’s mantra of “ _you love him, you love him, you love him_.” This is just disgusting.

“I mean, it’d just be easier, yeah?” Nick feels Harry’s arm wrap around his shoulder. “Easier isn’t better, you know. That’s settling. None of that,” and with that, Harry’s turning away because the water for the pasta is almost going over the edge of the pot.

Later on, when Nick is four glasses of wine down and Harry asleep next to him on his couch, his phone emits a small ‘ _ping_ ’ and he looks down and unlocks it, only to see a picture of Louis smiling with two of his sisters, and a little note under it that says “ _Thank you for everything._ ” He may tear up a bit and save it straight to his camera roll, but sleeping Harry is none the wiser.

\---

New Year’s Eve is possibly one of Nick’s favorite holidays. It gives him an excuse to get drunk, not have work the next day, and maybe possibly sleep with someone. It’s been a couple of weeks, he’s under a dry spell. He usually loves it, except for this year since lately his mind’s been stuck on Louis.

He’s at a company party, one that’s a bit more formal than a regular office party and one that has way more alcohol than most parties he’s been to, actually. Harry’s his date to the party since his mysterious new fling is visiting his family, and it’s funny to see how amazed Harry is at how lavish these events can be. That, or Nick’s just entirely desensitized from it.

It’s about an hour and a half into the party, there’s too many male models and too many rich, old women that Nick can’t do anything else but get completely drunk. Harry’s one step ahead of him, though, downing three shots in a row while Nick’s on his fifth or sixth vodka and cranberry. Less cranberry juice this time around, way more vodka. He can’t even tell the difference in taste at this point. There’s music blasting, and he can see Harry laughing and dancing all the while soaking up all the attention on him in the middle of the crowd, and he’s happy for him. He really is.

Harry’s made his way over to the bar and Nick’s side several times, trying to get Nick to let loose a bit and dance, but Nick declines each time. He’s in a bit of a depressing mood tonight, what with Louis not even bothering to text back after the first indication of Nick being drunk.

Nick is absolutely an awful texter when he’s drunk, so he’s not exactly sure if he blames Louis for that. He thinks that the texts he’s sent out are pretty coherent, definitely some of his best ones even. Louis has his read receipts on, though, so each time Nick texts him he knows Louis has read them. Each unanswered text is making Nick feel a bit more down, so he orders another vodka and cranberry and gets right to finding his own entertainment for the night. If Louis refuses answer him, then fuck him.

When he’s sober, Nick’s not a spiteful person one bit. Hell, it takes a lot for him to even stick up for himself. Tonight, though, he’s feeling pretty ruthless. He remembers that Louis might possibly still follow him on instagram, so he vows to take as many instagram pictures with as many male models as he can.

Nick brings home a friend that night, someone who he’s done this before, with the same expectations that Nick has. It’s not like Nick’s tied down or anything. However, if he basically thinks of Louis the whole time, then so be it. 

Louis doesn’t text Nick for the rest duration of his time away from London.

\---

It’s Monday and Nick is buzzing. There are exactly two exciting things that are happening today, one being Louis coming home (something he’s kind of hesitant about) and two being that some of Harry’s designs were approved for the new issue, and Nick requested that he be able to deliver the news to Harry himself. He’s got the approval notice clutched in his right hand, and he’s practically sprinting up the stairs to their office floor. He’s a little late to his own office, considering meetings on the first floor and all that, and when he walks into the office he immediately sees Louis sitting at his desk, showing Aimee and Harry something on his phone. Louis looks up immediately when he sees Nick, and gives Nick a small wave.

“Hey slacker,” he says in a fond tone, “you sleep in late or something?” And wow, there is absolutely no malicious intent in any of that, and Nick’s a little shocked for a second. He figured that he’d receive a little bit of backlash for his revenge spree on Thursday night, but nope. Nothing. He’s standing there with his mouth dropping, sort of resembling something close to a fish.

“No, actually!” he finally says when he gets over his shock. “I’ve been at meetings all day. Speaking of, Harry...can I see you in my office for a sec?” With that, he’s turning into his office with Harry hot on his trail, and then he waits for Harry to sit down so Nick can shut the door.

“What’s up? Got something Louis-related to tell me?” Harry asks, but before he even finishes talking, Nick’s slapping down a piece of paper in front of him, then relaxing back into his own seat with the biggest smug grin on his face.

“This is a joke,” Harry says, voice flat. He’s looking up at Nick, who is just shaking his head. “No. No. This is real? Nick, you’re serious? They approved some of my designs?”

“They want to have a meeting with you at around three o’clock to go over some technicalities, but yes, they approved quite a few.”

“Holy shit. Oh my god, Nick, this is incredible!” Harry’s finally jumping up from his seat and he’s motioning for Nick to stand up before he literally wraps himself around Nick like a boa constrictor. “Thank you, thank you, thank you! Thank you so much, Nick,” Harry’s saying over and over and over, and Nick’s done too much good for the past two weeks and it feels absolutely wonderful.

“Well, well, well, what do we have here?” Nick hears and almost immediately he drops his arms from Harry. Louis is standing against the doorway with his hips cocked to the side and his own arms crossed. His face is perfectly sculpted into that of pure indifference. Nick can’t tell if he’s actually seeing Louis’ eye twitch, though, or if he’s just imagining it because it’s something he wants to see.

“Some of my designs were approved for the new layout,” Harry’s telling him and Louis’ face lights up immediately and catches Harry in a hug. As Harry’s faced opposite from Nick, Louis catches his attention and gives him a thumbs up before rubbing Harry’s back again.

“Really really proud of you, H,” Louis is telling him, and then Harry’s stepping back.

“Alright lads,” Nick’s saying and sitting himself in his computer chair, “I would love to chat but I’ve got to get this mock issue done by Friday so the bosses can have a look.” He’s motioning them out, and Louis laughs a bit before pushing a still-emotional Harry out the door before him.

\--- 

“You’re surprised that he’s nice to you since you bought him a train ticket home?” Aimee asks over lunch, laughing into her napkin. “Wow, what a shocker! Man is nice after receiving a good present!” 

“No, I’m just suspicious. That’s all that it is. I’m not sure if I like him more when he’s being an insufferable brat, or if he is like he’s been all day today. He’s just like, soft-spoken and funny and not in a malicious way. It’s nice, that’s all,” Nick says, and he’s honestly not surprised when Aimee goes into a laughing fit again. 

“I can’t believe this. You actually want to _date_ him. Like you want to date him _really hard_. What I’m seeing right now is history: Nick Grimshaw thinking about settling down. This is unbelievable, absolutely incredible.”

“Shut it,” Nick’s saying and flicking a piece of rolled up napkin right into Aimee’s food. “If I may possibly want to...go into this for more than just say, like, a night or a month or even a year, is that really so awful?”

“It’s not, it’s not,” Aimee amends, “I’m just surprised it’s with the assistant you’ve been bitching about for the past three years. That’s all.”

“I’m kind of terrified,” Nick admits. “I’m already letting myself get too far into this that it’s gonna hurt if it turns out anything other than the way I want it to.” 

Aimee reaches her hand over to where Nick’s are laying on the table. “Hey, I’m proud of you. I like Louis, is the thing, but if he hurts you, I’ll have to castrate him.”

\--- 

It’s Friday, and Nick’s finally handed in his mock issue, and now he’s absolutely free. It was a tough deadline to meet, and everyone in the office is now visibly relaxed now that it’s over with. It’s in their hands now, and they’re free to relax at work for a week until it’s time to start up on the new issue already.

“Congrats!” Louis says as soon as he walks into Nick’s office. Nick’s slumped in his chair, and Louis smacks him upside the head before sitting down in the seat across. “Got plans for tonight?” 

“Not that I know of. Me and Puppy were just gonna have a night in, I assume. Got anything better, Tomlinson?” This is it. This is where Louis invites him somewhere and then leaves Nick stranded outside, at 3 AM, for dead. He’s been suspicious of Louis all week, Louis who’s been sweet and nothing but kind and respectful towards Nick. This is the end of his plan, though. This is what he’s been working on for three years.

“I was thinking drinks? Tonight at 8? You’d obviously have to pick me up and all, because I’m without transportation at the current moment.”

Nick smiles across at him. “That sounds good. I’ll shoot you a text before I’m about to head over.”

“Alright, I’ve gotta get going. Zayn’s picking me up today, and he said if I’m not outside at 5 exactly that he’ll drive off without me. Miserable twat,” Louis says and sends Nick another small wave before he’s out the door.

Nick doesn’t even think twice before he’s picking up the phone and calling Harry’s desk number and inviting him out tonight too.

\---

“You sure I’m meant to be here?” is the first thing Harry asks when he gets into the passenger seat of Nick’s car. “Louis invited you, yeah?”

Nick scoffs. “Please, it’s not a date or anything. Just some celebratory drinks for finishing the mock-up for the issue. I’m sure we’ll see other people from the office there.”

Harry shoots him a grin once he’s got his seatbelt buckled, and Nick starts making his way to Louis’ apartment. “I invited my sort-of boyfriend, hope you guys won’t mind. Told him I wanted him to meet a couple friends of mine.”

“I’ll have to make sure his intentions are pure, then, love. Nobody dates my dearest Harold and gets away without a stern talking to.”

“Alright, dad,” Harry says in a condescending tone, and Nick just rolls his eyes as he pulls up to Louis’ curb. Louis is already waiting outside, leaning against a streetlight, and he looks up the second he hears Nick’s car. His face falls immediately, however, when his eyes scan the passenger seat and he sees Harry sitting there already. 

He opens the backseat door of Nick’s car and slams it shut when he gets in, the sound of the door making Nick cringe a bit. He plays it off though, and tries to make eye contact with Louis in the rearview mirror. “Hello, Louis.” 

“Hi.” That’s all Louis offers.

“Excited for tonight?” Harry asks, and he turns around to look at Louis.

“No.”

That doesn’t deter Harry. “We’re just going to a regular pub, I think we’re too tired for dancing or anything like that, really.”

Nick sees Louis’ phone light up from the mirror. “Cool,” is all Louis says.

All week Nick’s suspicions were true. He knew for a fact that Louis’ behavior was way too good to be true. Louis is probably back there, texting his accomplice about how they’re going to finish him for good and kill Nick tonight.

Nick just raises the radio up to a loud volume where there’s no room for conversation, and drives the 5 and a half blocks from Louis’ flat to one of his favorite pubs.

\---

This night is going awful. Nick’s about to tear his hair out from frustration, Harry looks like he’s going to cry any second, and Louis is sitting in the middle of the booth with his arms crossed, getting more drunk with each passing minute. Nick and Harry can’t even have a conversation without Louis butting in with some rude remark.

“My, uh, guy is here,” Harry’s saying, and Nick watches as he gets up and walks as fast away from the booth as possible. 

“Must be so sad for you,” Louis says lowly, while staring down at his drink and swirling his straw out. It’s like his face is set in a permanent scowl.

Nick blinks. “I’m sorry?”

“Just sucks for you, that’s all,” Louis says and shrugs. 

Nick doesn’t even bother answering Louis, and instead opts for getting another round of drinks for them. As he’s waiting, the bartender slides another drink over to Nick, which he’s a bit confused about at first. This is definitely not what he ordered. “From over there,” he tells Nick and points to the opposite side of the bar on the left, and well. He’s gorgeous, for starters. He’s got his hair in a bit of a quiff, going in just about every direction. Since Nick left his glasses in the car and he’s a bit blind, he’s only able to make out a few of his facial features, but he can clearly see the sharp jawline and the dark scruff covering his chin.

He waves at Nick, which definitely pulls him out of his trance, and before Nick knows it he’s walking over. “Hi,” he says, offering his hand for Nick to shake. “My name’s John.”

“Nick,” he introduces himself and shakes John’s hand. “Thanks for the drink, mate.”

“Not a problem at all.” John lifts himself onto the barstool right beside Nick. “I was wondering, perhaps, if maybe you’d like to have another drink with me some time? Like, I could grab your number or something and give you a call?”

Nick does a quick glance at Louis back at the table, whose lips are set in an even thinner line before. “No, I’m sorry,” Nick tells him, and gives John a small smile, “I’m honestly really flattered, but I’m a bit preoccupied at the moment.”

John also glances at the table where Louis is sat, and gives Nick an understanding nod. “Thanks anyways. Hope you enjoy the drink,” he says and he even shakes Nick’s hand again before he’s walking away.

After Nick retrieves the drinks he originally ordered from the bartender, he’s walking back to the table carefully so as not to spill anything. “The funniest thing just happened,” he says as he’s passing Louis his drink, “when I was sitting at the table, this….GQ model just came up to me and asked me for my number. My ego’s been totally lifted, to be honest.” 

He sees the scowl on Louis’ face. He’s totally going to milk this.

“Did you give it to him?”

“No.”

“Why didn’t you get his number?” Louis asks, and Nick just shrugs.

“Didn’t want it,” is his answer.

“Just go get it. You’re so pathetic, honestly Nick. I know you have a thing for like, doe-eyed fashion kids, but c’mon Nick. Are you literally blind? We all know you can do better than that. What kind of life is that even? I swear to god you’re probably the most miserable person I’ve ever met.”

Nick’s so tired of listening to Louis complain that he actually does get up and walk back over to where John’s seated at the bar.

John’s a bit surprised to see him, given the circumstances before, but Nick just smiles as bright as ever. “So, uh, that other things sort of fell through, I think. Do you think I could still give you my number?” John seems really happy about the sudden change, and he’s turning to grab a pen from the bar.

He’s doing this strictly to make Louis jealous (he’s not sure when he became a vengeful person), so he feels awful as he’s writing down his work number on the palm of John’s hand and not his personal one. This way, it’s a little easier to let him down in the future. John thanks him again, and Nick leaves him with a bit of a flirty smile.

When Harry finally walks back to the booth, next to him is….Zayn? It’s Zayn.

“Freelance model, huh?” Nick says as they’re sitting down. “Not surprised at all. To be honest, I don’t even know why I didn’t guess it in the first place.”

“Good to see you again,” Zayn says and brings his hand across the table for Nick to shake. Nick looks over to see Louis’ reaction and he’s just as shocked, if not more than, as Nick.

“Zayn. You’re dating Zayn?”

“Well,” Harry’s looking shyly over at Zayn, who’s holding his hand, “we haven’t really discussed anything official.”

Louis just laughs, the cold edge to it making Nick cringe a little. “That’s brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. Is this like, your other job or something?” He’s shrugging his coat back on, and after a few tries, he finally gets it on correctly. He’s a bit wobbly on his feet when he stands up, signalling he may be more drunk than he seems, and Zayn reaches out a hand to steady him.

“Can you not be a miserable twat for a night, Louis?” he’s asking, and Louis just shrugs himself out of Zayn’s grip.

“Not when Harry’s out doing this shit. Is stealing literally all my friends on your bucket list or something, Harry?” With that, he’s off somewhere toward the exit of the pub, and Harry tries to get up but Zayn just puts a gentle hand on his shoulder, and Nick watches as Harry relaxes and sits back down in his seat.

“He’s drunk,” Zayn says with a shrug and apologizes for Louis for what seems to be the millionth time. Harry seems to trust Zayn, considering he really is the closest to Louis out of all of them. “We all do stupid things when we’re drunk, yeah? Louis has a tendency to pull this stuff.”

“He’s actually going to get himself killed,” Nick says and he puts his own jacket on. “I’ll go get him. You guys enjoy the rest of your night, alright?”

On the list of Nick’s best talents, catching a cab is definitely in the top five, at least.  He doesn’t even want to risk driving his own car at the moment, so he tells the cab driver he’ll pay him extra if he can drive up next to the sidewalk where Louis is walking, a couple yards down the road.

“Louis, get in the car,” he says once his window is rolled down, but Louis just ignores him. He’s drunk, he’s angry, and Nick thinks he’s trying to show his anger by stomping, but he just sort of looks like a duck with oversized webbed feet. It’s actually kind of endearing, but Nick doesn’t even stop to think about that since Louis is probably endangering himself by walking in London drunk and alone at night.

“Please, Louis, I’m sorry.” He doesn’t know what he’s sorry for, but Nick’s heard that apologizing helps.

“No.” At least he’s finally getting a response. 

“I understand you’re an independent man who can get home by himself, but you’re literally going to get yourself killed, Louis. Get in the car.”

“No.” The cab driver is getting impatient now. He’s run over the curb three or four times trying to follow Nick’s orders.

Nick lets out a dramatic sigh. “Louis, I honestly refuse to be cast as the Warner to your Elle Woods in this film, dick wad, so get your ass in the car now or I’m gone. It’s fucking freezing.” 

Louis finally relents, letting out a frustrated grunt and pushing Nick aside to get into the cab. “I don’t even know what you’re fucking talking about Nick. We can’t even be friends because you honestly make the worst references.”

“Louis, that’s blasphemy, really,” Nick turns his attention back to Louis after he tells the driver his address. “Legally Blonde is a classic and that was a great reference. I honestly applaud myself for thinking of that in crunch time.”

“That wasn’t my address,” Louis says, and Nick just stays silent. “Are you taking me back to yours?”

“Yes, possibly,” Nick answers.

“Over my dead fucking body,” Louis is saying and he moves to open the door, but Nick stops him.

“Please just come home with me tonight.” Nick’s hand is resting over Louis’s arm, feeling how tense all his muscles are. It half arousing and half upsetting. His jaw is clenched and he’s looking at Nick through the corners of his eyes.  “Please.” He’s not above begging when it comes to Louis at all, really.  Also, Harry has been dropping suggestive hints once or twice in his own conversation with Zayn at the bar while Nick was getting his coat on, so he’s very worried for Louis’ well-being.

“Fine.” It’s a win in Nick’s book.

\---

“I’m going to take a shower. Please, for Christ’s sake, don’t ruin my apartment. I’ll have you know Puppy is really very vicious, and will probably do something awful like growl at you if you step out of line.” 

“Your dog’s name is Puppy. Like, you named your dog Puppy.”

“I did.” He’s ignoring Louis’ scoff as Nick signals him for him to take his shoes off. He’s not a neat freak, really, but since Louis is being particularly catty he might as well throw it back to him.

“Now, feel free to whatever’s in the kitchen, whatever movies I have, anything. You’ll be sleeping on the couch but it’s actually really comfy, sometimes I prefer it to my own bed.” Nick’s off to the shower then, and the second he closes the bathroom door behind him, he can hear his kitchen cabinets opening and slamming shut. He wouldn’t even be half surprised if Louis was looking for the liquor.

After a relaxing shower, he steps out of his bathroom and is a bit scared to hear, well, absolutely nothing. There’s silence on Louis’ end and Nick power walks to his kitchen the second he hears a small thud.

Well, Nick wasn’t wrong about Louis looking for the liquor cabinet. He’s absolutely trashed. He’s sprawled out on Nick’s kitchen floor with a bottle of Malibu Coconut Rum in one hand and his cellphone in the other. 

“Who are you texting?” Nick asks and leans down to gently pry the rum away from Louis, who lets it go without protest.

“Harry,” he says with a shrug, “tellin’ him I’m sorry.” 

“That’s great of you,” Nick tells him earnestly and crouches down so he’s eye-level with Louis. He glances down at Louis’ phone and the letters on it vaguely resemble _sorry_ , except there’s maybe a couple t’s and too many r’s thrown in. “You wanna do me a favor?” Louis takes a second to hit send, and then he’s lifting his head up to look at Nick with glazed eyes. 

“Depends what it is, Mr. Grimshaw. I’m off the clock right now.” Louis says with a bit of a smirk, and it would be clever if he wasn’t drooling a bit. That’s just beautiful.

Before Nick says anything, he opens his fridge to grab two water bottles quickly. “I’m gonna need you to drink both of these before you fall asleep, yeah?” Louis groans. “Stop whining, you’ll be thanking me in the morning. And take three of these painkillers,” Nick continues, standing up and reaching for the pill bottle in the cabinet. He shakes three out and hands them to Louis, who takes them with his water immediately.

“Now, are we ready for bed?”

Louis groans and hits his head back against the wall.  “Are you gonna make me sleep on your uncomfortable couch?” Well, he was going to before Louis got himself drunk again after he had sobered up a bit on the way home.

“What do I look like?” Nick asks when he’s helping Louis stand up. “A monster? You’re sleeping in my bed because I don’t want you dying in your sleep.” Louis can hardly walk, christ. Nick slings his arm over his shoulder, and he has to duck quite a bit so he doesn’t do something like accidentally pop Louis’s shoulder out of its socket. He’s actually quite short compared to Nick.

They finally reach Nick’s bedroom, and Nick quickly gets Louis settled on his side. “Your water’s on the table, and I brought up a few extra blankets so you’re not totally freezing tonight.” 

“Mmm, good boyfriend,” Louis says as he scratches his cheek against the pillow. Nick shoots up straight, his face going pale. He’s trying to think of a reply or what to do next or something. His brain is just completely fried.

“Can you help me take my clothes off?” Louis cuts him out of his panic as he rests his head against the pillow. “I can’t sleep with clothes on.” He’s successfully taking his own shirt off while still laying sideways.

Nick blacks out for a second. He never even knew Louis had this many tattoos. “Louis, you’re not sleeping naked in my bed.”

“Yes I am,” Louis protests, trying to kick off his own jeans. They’re halfway down his legs and Nick is too busy staring at them before he realizes that Louis literally fell asleep in the process of taking his jeans off.

He’s not sure what to do, so he just kind of throws a blanket over him and makes sure that the rubbish bin is set on the floor next to Louis, and then he gets into bed and makes sure he’s as far away from Louis as possible.

\---

It’s morning and Nick feels more relaxed than ever. He can feel the sun hitting his back and it’s almost warm enough that he doesn’t need a blanket, so he pushes it down and spreads out on his bed an- Louis isn’t there. Louis was sleeping next to him last night and he’s not there anymore. Nick’s throwing on sweatpants and grabbing his keys before he can even think. He’s about to have a panic attack because Louis was so drunk last night and now Nick has no idea where he is, if he’s even alive anymore. No, no, no. He rushes into the kitchen, trying to get his breathing under control when he looks up and sees a fully clothed Louis standing at the stove, with his back facing Nick. 

“Good morning,” Louis says and throws a smile over his shoulder. Nick’s trying to remember how to breathe. He has to keep reminding himself that Louis is safe and alive.

“You alright?” Louis asks. “I know I burnt the eggs, but is the smoke from it really that bad?”

“No, no, you’re alright,” Nick says with a bit of a breathless laugh, and finally he’s composed himself enough to sit down at the table. “I just, uh, have some issues.”

“Issues?”

“Yeah, I don’t like people leaving before I’m awake. I know, it’s a bit weird, but I just...if you ever stay over again, could you please just stay put until I wake up?” Louis nods before Nick even finishes.

“I’m sorry. I am so sorry Nick,” Louis is saying and Nick just nods. He can still feel that his breathing hasn’t evened out yet. 

“It’s alright,” he says after a tense moment. “Anyways, why are you cooking? Shouldn’t you be like, hungover?”

“Just a thank you for last night, I guess. Heard I was an idiot,” Louis says and spoons some of the eggs onto a plate for Nick, along with two pieces of bacon.

“It happens, yeah?” Nick says and munches on the bacon, because there’s no way he’s going towards those eggs.

“More often than not these days,” Louis mumbles, and Nick’s sure he wasn’t supposed to hear it.  In a louder voice, then, “also, I guess I’ve got a bit of apologizing to do, yeah? I’ve been a bit of an arse for the past three years.”

Nick snorts as he takes a sip of his water. “A bit? You’ve almost gotten me fired on at least seven occasions.”

“Listening to authority isn’t exactly my forte? I’m also a bit of a prick when it comes to dealing with over-privileged arseholes.”

Nick can’t even be offended at the way Louis bluntly stated it. “Incredible. You’re the only person I know who can insult a person and try to apologize at the same time, Louis, really. Who taught you your manners?”

Louis slaps Nick on his shoulder when he walks past him to sit. “Can I finish?” He’s so cute when he’s irritated.

“Of course,” Nick relents and nods to motion for him to keep going.

“That day when we were planning for the office Christmas party, I was so infuriated at you for saying how you wouldn’t have gone to uni if it weren’t for your parents giving you a free ride. Maybe jealous is a better word for it? I just wish I would have had that same opportunity, you know? A free ride and maybe a chance to experience uni and all that. You said something similar to me on my first day working there, though. I’ve had quite a distaste for you since.”

Nick has no idea what to say.

“It was just me being irrational about my family’s money problems and my inability to acquire loans, and I realize now it never had anything to do with you. So, take this as my apology. Treasure it; this doesn’t happen very often, you know. You’re not _that_ bad of a bloke.”

“Not that bad of a bloke? What did I ever do to deserve such an honorary title?” Nick asks and dramatically throws a hand over his chest. He can hear Louis laughing, so that’s at least a plus. “In all seriousness, though, there’s really no hard feelings between us. Sure you’re like, a terror and you made me dread going to the office but it’s fine. Totally fine.” Nick’s grin is growing by the second, then he bursts out into full laughter when he hears Louis start laughing. 

He feels a bit warmer all around. 

“What are your plans for the day?” Louis asks when they’ve calmed down. “Am I interrupting anything important?”

Nick shrugs.  “All I’ve got planned is taking Puppy out for a walk since it’s nice out, if you’d like to join us?”

Louis just absolutely beams. “Yeah,” he says softly, looking down at Puppy who’s circling around the table, “I’d really, really like that.”

\---

“Puppy, please stop antagonizing that dog,” Nick’s said for about the fifteenth time. Louis has been relatively quiet for their walk thus far, making small conversation every now and then.

“I swear to god, she’s so tiny but she’s an absolute monster,” Nick says, crouching down when Puppy rounds his legs. He picks her up and lets her lick his face a little bit. “Reminds me of you in dog form.”

Louis lets out a loud laugh at that, and Nick looks up to watch as he throws his head back and laughs. His cheeks are a subtle pink, probably from the cold, and he’s got little wrinkles at the corners of his eyes. He’s just beautiful, there’s absolutely no other way to put it. His hair’s in a sort of messy quiff, his glasses are on, and he stole one of Nick’s jumpers to put under his jacket, but it’s a little bit long on him. Nick already knows he loves Louis in his clothes.

“So I’ve come to realize I don’t know all that much about you? Like, your home life and whatnot. I do a lot of talking about my own family, it’s only fair you tell me a bit about yours.”

“Aside from my mum and siblings, I don’t like to get into it much, really,” Louis says with a shrug while he stuffs his hands into his jean pockets. “It’s just that my biological father fucked off when I was little, so for a while it was just my mum, you know? Then she married my step-dad, and he was great, even changed my last name to his. He was really a great father figure, but then he and my mum got a divorce, so then it was just back to us.”

He pauses for a second and when he starts talking about his mother, Nick can see the way his face lights up a bit, his shoulders raise, his voice a little less wobbly. “My mum has always done it all, what with providing for the family and still being able to take the responsibility of both parents. She’s great, really. She’s a nurse, so I tried to help her out as much as I could, doing the chores and watching the girls most nights. Between that on the weekdays and parties on the weekends, there wasn’t that much room for improvement in schoolwork.” Louis is looking down and he’s got his hands in his pockets. Nick’s absolutely terrified to say anything in case Louis’ momentum breaks.

“So, my grades were awful. By the time I gained enough common sense to turn ‘em around, it was pretty much too late. Also, there was the added factor in lack of money. So, my friends went to uni and I got stuck back here, working as an assistant. Always planned to go to uni, but always ended up putting it off. Now I’m here." 

“That’s…” Nick’s still at a loss for words. “Really, really selfless of you, Louis. Like, as much as you say that it was because you didn’t care, you realize how much easier you made your mum’s life?” He nudges Louis with his elbow, and Louis finally cracks a smile. “Really brave if you ask me, Tomlinson.”

“Even braver than the time I painted your iPhone?” He’s finally, finally cracking jokes again. Nick may be a little bit in love with him. Or definitely in love with him.

“Yeah, I think it’s braver than that.”

\---

Now that Nick’s come to think of it, this Monday isn’t actually so bad. He got a minimum of ten hours of sleep last night, so Nick walks into work feeling refreshed. He sends a smile Aimee’s way and waves to Louis (who beams at him) before he walks into his office. Not even a minute after he’s sat down, there’s a knock on his door. “Come in,” he shouts, and he hears the door open but doesn’t bother looking up from his computer. 

He hears someone clear their voice, and he looks up to see Harry. Harry, who’s holding something very suspicious behind his back. “Hello, Harold,” he says and rests his chin on his hands. “What can I do for you today?" 

“Well, I just wanted to uh, thank you properly for submitting my designs. I know you were kind of hesitant about it, so I just really wanted to say thank you.”

“You really don’t need to thank me, you know,” Nick says and turns his monitor off, giving Harry his full attention. “Your designs were good, Harry.”

Harry’s face turns a bit red. He’s cute, like a cherub, Nick thinks. “Thanks. And I know, but it was really nice of you to do so.” With that, he’s pulling whatever he was holding over his head so Nick can finally see it properly, and wow.

“Does it plug in?” Nick asks, and Harry’s walking towards the power outlet by the door before Nick even finishes the question. Once it’s plugged in, Nick can finally see how cool it actually is.

The fact that it’s neon blue is the first thing Nick notices obviously. In unique cursive writing, it simply says _Enjoy_ and Nick loves it. He loves that Harry knows him so well already that he’s picked out something that Nick would absolutely buy for himself. He’s also pretty sure the sign probably costed an arm and a leg, but Harry’s looking at him all happily and well. Nick knows Harry well enough to know that him saying something along the lines of “I can’t accept this” would be more rude than just simply accepting the present.

“This is awesome, Harry,” he says finally, and he’s standing up and grabbing the sign. “I’m going to put it up on this shelf,” Nick says and unplugs it, only to plug it into the electrical socket on the opposite side of the room. After he makes sure it’s properly seated on the shelf, Nick finally takes a big stride to give Harry a proper hug. 

Of course, that would be the best time for Louis to walk in. “Good morning! It sounds too quiet in here for my liking. I’ll have you know I brought you coffee,” he says in a chipper voice, but then he’s peering around the door and he sees Nick and Harry in a tight embrace. “Well, it really is a good morning for you two,” his voice changes to bitter, and if Nick’s right, jealousy.

He likes how he can detect Louis’ moods now with his actions, and how before it was just plain old hatred towards Nick, and now there’s more to the spectrum. There’s happy Louis, sad Louis, angry Louis, jealous Louis, and so on. Nick likes that it’s no longer blatant dislike anymore.

Harry and Nick break apart quickly, like they’ve been caught at something they’re not supposed to be doing. Louis eyes narrow, and he quickly eyes up the Enjoy sign on the shelf above Nick’s head, and then the handwritten notes on Nick’s desk. ( _“You have a computer,” he remembers Louis telling him, “and a very nice one. Why are you handwriting your notes?” Nick shrugged. “Makes me feel like I’m actually working. Like, I’m earning my pay or something. I know it’s weird, just leave me be.”_ )

Nick knows exactly what’s happening before it unfolds. Louis slams the coffee on the desk, but tilts it so it lands sideways, causing the coffee to spill out everywhere and completely destroy his notes.

“Harry,” Nick says through gritted teeth, “I need to speak with Louis. Alone.”

Harry’s out the door in record time.

Louis just crosses his arms and looks towards Nick’s feet. He’s got an angry look on his face. “It was a gift, Louis. You couldn’t keep your fucking cool over a god damn present.”

“No. You know what? No,” Louis is saying as he drops his arms. “You’re not the victim here, Nick. I totally get what you see in him, I do. He’s a nice boy, he’s tall, he’s got great hair, he’s really talented. See? I get it. But what you haven’t seemed to get is that he’s _dating my best friend_ , and Nick, let me tell you, if you’re the reason why my best friend’s heart is broken I’m going to do a lot worse than anything I’ve ever done in the past three years.” Louis honestly looks vicious and like he’s out for Nick’s blood, but even though he’s significantly shorter than Nick, Nick’s quite scared of him.

He’s scared of him, that is, before what Louis is saying finally registers in Nick’s brain. 

Nick starts laughing, which is probably the worst thing he could do at a time like this, because the next thing he knows Louis is spilling his own cup of coffee all over the desk, and while the previous cup hadn’t managed to damage the mock-up that was returned to Nick’s desk before he even got into his office, Louis dumps his entire cup right over it. 

Nick can literally feel his job falling apart right then. “Are you serious?” he says in an ominous tone. “Are you fucking kidding me?” His voice actually booms. He sees Louis actually flinch. 

“You just ruined my mock-up that was supposed to be sent out today, Louis. I’m going to get fired because of your fucking temper tantrums.”

Louis gasps. His face is turning redder by the second, and he rushes forward to Nick’s desk, grabbing paper towels and trying to mop up some of the mess on the surface.  “Oh my god, Nick, I’m so sorry. I honestly didn’t mean to ruin the mock-up, you know I wouldn’t do that on purpose.”

Nick covers his face with his hands. “You deliberately spilled coffee all over my desk, and now you’re saying you ‘didn’t mean it’? What load of shit is that, Louis?”

“I’m trying to apologize, Ni-” 

“I don’t fucking care, Louis,” Nick says through gritted teeth, “just get out of my office. I can’t even deal with you right now.” 

Louis’ face drops, and he storms out of Nick’s office.

\---

“So now the mock-up’s gone,” Mr. Cooper repeats, and Nick nods for what seems to be the hundredth time, “because your assistant spilled coffee all over it.” He doesn’t like the way Mr. Cooper has simplified the story Nick was trying to tell because it sounds too….well, it sounds like that’s exactly what happened. It really was an accident, is the point he’s trying to get across.

“Yes, but I’ll be able to print everything all over. The problem is just having it all printed, so we might miss sending it in today by the deadline." 

“Let me ask you a question, Nick,” Mr. Cooper starts and leans forward onto the desk, “how willing are you to go without an assistant for a bit? He seems to cause you too much trouble.”

“What do you mean, like, fire him?” Nick asks and Mr. Cooper nods. “It was an accident, he honestly didn’t mean to do it. He’s probably downstairs worried sick now.” He’s covering up for Louis again, but he figures you have to make sacrifices for love sometimes.

“Be honest,” Ben says and leans back again into his chair, “how many complaints have you filed because of him?”

“A lot,” Nick admits.

“He’s wasting company time, Nick.”

Nick refuses to break eye contact. “He’s a good worker, Ben. Hiring someone else when we have a person perfectly capable of doing the job is what’s going to be wasting company time, not him.” He crosses his arms in an act of defiance, which actually seems to work.

Two seconds later, Mr. Cooper’s face breaks down from the stern look to a more relaxed, yet worried expression. “Alright fine,” he relents. “We’re a couple days ahead of schedule anyways, so we can get another one printed and send it out then. If I hear any more complaints, Nick, I have no choice.”

“I know, I know.” Nick’s nodding fast. “Thank you,” he says and thanks him four more times for good measure before they both exit the room. He leaves with a quick shake of his boss’s hand, and then he’s off downstairs to get to printing everything up again.

\--- 

Nick feels a sense of dread the second he turns the corner into his office.

He knows it from the second he sees the look of panic on Harry’s face, who’s looking from Louis’ desk into Nick’s. When he looks around the door, he finally sees Louis sitting at his desk, safe open, with all of his write-ups surrounded on the (now dry) desk around him.

Louis sucks in a deep breath, and when he speaks his tone is no louder than a whisper. “You’re really shit at passwords.” He pauses to take another breath, then Nick watches as the faintest smile ghosts over his face. “Your birthday backwards was the code,” he says, as if Nick didn’t know this already.

“What is this, Nick?” Louis asks in the same soft voice, and all Nick’s doing is watching him sort through the hundreds of slips. “You never handed these in?”

“It’s not like I wasn’t planning on it,” Nick says after a moment, but he knows the excuse is weak. “I’ve just been, y’know, busy.” He shrugs one shoulder and refuses to make eye contact with Louis. 

“This one’s from 2011,” Louis said as he holds up one specific slip, “that was _three_ years ago.”

“Must have forgot that one, then,” Nick says, and he’s actually really embarrassed that Louis is going through literally _all of them_.

Louis looks up again. “Why didn’t you just let me get fired?”

Nick’s shoulders slump. He falls into the chair next to him, and slouches down and for a second he wishes that he could actually just become the chair. “Oh I don’t know, probably because I have morals.” His face is bright red, he knows it. “You know, you were nineteen when you came in for the job.”

“I’m aware.” 

“You had no resume, no references, nothing. Before this, you worked at a Toys ‘R’ Us for minimum wage, Louis.”

Silence on Louis’ end. 

“It was so bold, you know? That’s something I’ve always admired. You were a risk taker, so when you showed up to the interview wearing jeans, I thought ‘wow, this is so unconventional.’ Figured giving you a chance would be a pretty big risk on my end.” Nick shrugs again. “So, I did.” 

It’s taking a second for Louis to reply. He’s laid out all the write-up slips all over Nick’s desk.  

“That’s really nice of you.” Grinning, he picks up one of the slips. “‘While I was away yesterday, Louis Tomlinson moved my desk into the kitchen and moved the water cooler and bookshelf and the big plant to where my desk was. And he changed the photo that I have of my dog in a frame to a photo of the fridge. This is taking personal property and wasting company time because it took me two hours to move it all back by myself because he was he was too busy researching wasps to help.’ Jesus Christ, I put so much effort into these pranks. Like, most days I’d even stay after to make sure they were perfect.” 

That explains so much, really. “I always thought you were doing some work that you never got up to.”

“No,” Louis shakes his head, “not at all, actually. I was a bit of a shit, wasn’t I?”

Nick definitely doesn’t object. He shrugs his left shoulder. “You still are, a bit.”

“I haven’t been that bad in while,” Louis protests, looking mildly offended.

“Well,” Nick hesitates, unsure if bringing up the coffee incident is too soon or not, “you did spill coffee all over the mock-up.”

Louis at least has the decency to look sorry about it. “I really didn’t know it was the mock-up. I thought the papers were just your handwritten notes, because I do copy them while you’re at lunch just in case I do happen to ruin them.”

Nick allows himself to look mildly shocked for a second. “So you’re saying that you, Louis Tomlinson, had my well-being in mind at one point in time?”

Louis is grinning from ear to ear. “Well, I’m sure I had some ulterior motive behind it. I mean, can’t be nice to you, Nick Grimshaw.”

The smile that Nick sends him in return makes his grin even bigger.

\---

The next two days are blissful. Nick and Louis are quite a team when they’re not constantly plotting against each other. Their truce is making everyone on edge; Harry’s suspicious, Aimee’s suspicious, the woman at the cubicle on the far right corner of the office is suspicious. It’s clear that when everyone realizes there’s no constant tension, however, everyone can breathe a bit easier.

It’s nice, though, spending time with Louis. Instead of the constant bickering, they spend more time in Nick’s office having _friendly_ conversations. Nick hasn’t gotten any work done at all in the past few days but he’s completely past caring now. He has one meeting left for the day, after lunch, and all he’s thinking about is getting to come back from said meeting and spend more time with Louis which probably isn’t good for his work ethic, but again, he’s past caring now.

He’s got the mock-up freshly printed again, and now all he has to do is submit it to his boss and his work for the February/March issue is done. He even leaves his office five minutes early before the meeting, too excited to hand the work over to somebody else.

Once they’ve all established that they’re happy with the rough draft of the issue, they all break from the meeting. Nick’s having the best day ever.

He’s free from any real obligations for the rest of the day. Nick’s practically sprinting down the stairs to get to his office and start slacking for the rest of the day, which is funnily enough totally out of character for him but he thinks maybe he deserves it just this once. 

His good mood is ruined instantly the second he steps in and sees Louis at his desk, slumped over his computer and so very adamantly not looking at Nick. “You have a new message,” is all Louis says, and Nick’s not exactly sure what happened between the time he left for the meeting and came back. 

That’s resolved, though, once Nick actually plays the message. “ _Hey Nick, it’s John. I’m not sure if you remember me from the bar, but I was just calling to see if maybe you’d like to schedule a date sometime soon? Looking forward to hearing back from you._ ”  Fuck. Nick slams his head so hard on the desk so hard he think he might have a concussion.

Maybe giving John his office number wasn’t the best idea Nick’s ever had.

 --- 

It’s a week into Louis ignoring him, or as Nick likes to call it: the Ice Age. Louis does everything that’s asked of him, and Nick really misses Louis, even though he’s physically there.

Nick preferred  Louis trying to make his life miserable over Louis not talking to him.

There’s a soft knock at his door, and before Nick can answer it, Louis peeks his head from around it. “Hey boss, I’ve got the stomach flu, so I think I’m going to head out now.”

“You alright?” Nick shoots up from his chair. Louis actually does look really pale and exhausted. “Do you need a ride home?” he’s asking as he rushes up to get his coat. 

“No,” Louis said with a small laugh that’s devoid of any humor. “Zayn’s picking me up. I’ll uh, see you tomorrow then.”

Later, when Nick’s out of work to do and desperately waiting for anything to come up, a new email from Human Resources pops up in his inbox. The title: **new applications for assistant position.**

“No,” Nick says once, and then, “no. No, no, no, no, no.” He has to read over the email at least three times before he fully understands that Louis is _actually quitting_. His hand lands on phone in two seconds flat.

“What,” Harry says, tone flat.

“My office, now,” is all Nick’s able to muster up, then he hangs up. Harry’s there soon enough, closing the door behind him, crossing his arms, and giving Nick the best attempt at a glare he’s ever seen come from Harry. 

“He quit?” Nick asks, and Harry just closes his eyes and sighs. 

“What did you expect him to do, Nick? You’re leading him on, and once he thinks he has a chance with you, he has to listen to a message from a guy that you gave your number to _right in front of Louis_.”

“Louis told me to do it.”

“And how many times have you listened to Louis when he told you to do something? I’m pretty sure whenever Louis tells me to do something as idiotic as that, I just ignore him.” Harry shrugs and visibly deflates, sinking down into the chair across from Nick. “He told me he felt like he was just wasting his life here on some guy who was obviously moving on with his.” 

Nick thumps his head on the desk. “I fucked up, Harry.”

“Yeah you did. You really did.”

He doesn’t know what to do. He promptly tells Harry this. He’s got his eyes closed against the desk when he hears a little metal thump near his ear, and when he lifts his head he sees a key laying in front of him. 

“Look, Zayn and I decided to take the next step forward, so that the key to his flat. You need it more than I do right now.” Nick doesn’t even think twice; he’s getting up and shrugging his coat on, making sure to grab the apartment key and his own car keys on the way out of his office.

“I so owe you, Harry Styles,” Nick says, giving him a hug before he’s out of his office, “anything you want when I get back.” He doesn’t even wait for Harry’s reply, just hearing his laugh’s enough, and he’s literally sprinting down the emergency exit stairs.

He’s not sure he’s ever driven this fast to get somewhere in his life. Nick’s broken about 30 traffic laws on the short, ten minute distance to Louis’ apartment, so it’s a miracle that he hasn’t been pulled over yet. Nick cuts the travel time to Louis’ by at least four minutes; it’s a win in his book.

Nick’s not sure how he’s suddenly gained the ability to parallel park so perfectly on the first try, but he’s sure that there’s some higher power making sure everything goes right today. He’s literally rushing out of his car and into the building, silently praying that Zayn won’t be home so Nick won’t get his own ass handed to him on a platter. He takes the stairs three at a time to get to the second floor, practically shivering in anticipation and adrenaline. Once he unlocks Louis’ apartment door and steps in, it’s silent. Good. No Zayn here to kick his ass.

He remembers Louis’ room briefly from the time Louis threw up on his shoes, so he quietly tiptoes his way to the bedroom. The door is slightly ajar, and Nick can see Louis curled up under his blanket, looking small and just absolutely broken. He lets out a breath, and finally opens the door all the way. 

Louis picks his head up sharply, sitting up the second he sees Nick. “What are you doing here?” Nick can see dried tear stains on his cheeks. He really fucked up. 

“I came here to tell you that you’re an idiot.” The second the sentence leaves his mouth, Nick just wants to grab the words and take them back in. He actually visibly flinches when he sees Louis’ face change from vulnerable to hard and guarded.

“Oh, well that’s just fucking brilliant. ‘You’re an idiot,’ that’s what you tell me. You’re such a twat, Nick, you know that?” Louis is getting out of his bed to stand up and walk closer to Nick. He looks up at Nick and jabs his pointer finger in his chest. It’s adorable, really, how he tries to act intimidating. “I can’t believe I put up with you for as long as I did, honestly, Ni-” Louis is cut off by Nick placing both hands on Louis’ cheeks. He’s studying for a second how his entire hand spans the side of Louis’ head, but that’s something else to think about later. For now, Nick has some other duties to tend to. 

“You have literally ruined my life, Louis. You’re seriously the worst person I think I’ve ever met, the absolute _bane_ of my existence.”

Louis takes a step back and turns his head away. “Honestly, if all you’re here to do is insult me, I’d rather you see your way out.”

“Let me finish,” Nick says and fills the gap between them again. He tilts Louis’ chin upwards and watches as Louis’ eyelashes flutter. He’s so close to Louis that he can feel every time Louis inhales, exhales. “There was at some point though, in between you absolutely ruining my life while charming everyone else around you, that I actually fell in love with you.” He watches as Louis’ eyes open back up again before he settles on a soft smile. “Silly me.”

Louis looks like he doesn’t know how to process it at first, but then Nick watches as his eyes crinkle and his face splits into a huge smile. He whispers, “silly you,” then his arms are lifting up and wrapping around Nick’s neck. This is everything Nick has ever wanted. He takes the last step, though, which is bending his head down just an inch more to connect his own lips with Louis’. It’s perfect, is what it is. He’s subconsciously known it for quite a while, but the fact that Nick wants _everything_ with Louis is coming to a head in the front of his mind.

He’s got Louis crowded up against the wall once they break apart a bit for air, and Nick’s just running one hand through Louis’ quiff. Louis is dazedly smiling up at him, giving him little kisses every few seconds that don’t lead much to anywhere else, but Nick knows they’ve got all the time in the world for that. “I want, like, everything with you, Louis.”

Louis makes an inquisitive noise. “What do you mean?”

“I’m not sure if you knew this,” Nick says and waits until Louis’ eyes fully open to continue, “but you’re sort of it for me, Louis Tomlinson. I’m pretty mad over you.”

Louis absolutely beams and lets out a breathless laugh. “The feeling’s mutual, I think, Nicholas Grimshaw.”

\---

It’s Louis’ last day as Nick’s assistant. Nick’s not even that upset about it, to be honest. When Louis put his two weeks in, Nick got an overwhelming amount of applications but in the first batch of applications, one Harry Styles was in the mix. The second Nick saw Harry’s name, he hired him to replace Louis and officially get a paid position in the company. Also, there’s maybe a company policy that states you’re not supposed to date your co-workers, and Nick’s totally not down with that.

Today is Louis’ going away party, so Nick resists the temptation to whisk him away and kiss him until his lips are swollen every few minutes in order to let Louis bask in all the attention that he’s getting from people in the office. Louis had pulled him aside just fifteen minutes ago, saying how he never even realized how well-liked he was in the office. Nick could have told Louis that, really. Every time Louis got up to some new prank concerning Nick, they’d all laugh and tell Nick how lucky he was to have such a _joy_ as his assistant. 

Nick doesn’t blame them at all, though, for loving Louis. He’s got such a vibrant personality, and the way he moves around the room to greet absolutely everyone is amazing. He even remembers all their names, which is something Nick still cannot do, even after being there longer than Louis has.

There’s a cake on the table that says _Good Luck, Louis!_ which is something Nick himself picked up on his way to work. He’s also got a bit of a uni essentials basket to give to Louis for when Louis starts uni again in the upcoming semester.

For now, though, Louis is happy enough just to be in the presence of everyone at his last day in the office. Him and Nick are leaving early today, though, because they’ve got a reservation at some upscale restaurant in London. It’s really a very important date.

Nick loves spoiling him.

When Nick’s in the office kitchen away from everyone, making himself another cup of coffee, he hears the kitchen door open and he looks up to see Louis, whose smile hasn’t left his face since he got to work this morning.

He props himself up on the counter next to Nick’s coffee station, simply watching him as he stirs in a bit of sugar. “Love you, you know.”

Nick looks up then and sees Louis smiling a bit bashfully and biting his own lip. He moves in between Louis’ legs with his hands firmly placed on his upper thighs. “Love you too. Can’t wait for our date later.”

“I’m kind of sad to leave the place,” Louis says and wraps his arms around Nick’s neck. “It’ll be sad when I’m not your assistant anymore.” 

“Well,” Nick shrugs, “you’re welcome to being my assistant at home, if you’d like. I need someone to cook for me anyways.”

“I take everything I said about being in love with you back. You’re awful.”

“You’re the worst,” Nick says with a bit of a laugh, and then he’s twining his fingers together with Louis, who’s pulling Nick in for another kiss.

It feels like home.

\---

And on Monday morning, when Nick’s alarm goes off at half past six and Louis’ hair is tickling his face, he wraps his arm tighter around Louis’ torso and decides that Monday mornings aren’t a bad thing if he gets to wake up every day like this.

**Author's Note:**

> follow me on [tumblr](http://pillowquiff.tumblr.com) and/or [twitter](http://twitter.com/pillowquiff)!


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